Policeman escorting polio field workers gunned down

Mardan district halts vaccination campaign indefinitely.

PESHAWAR:

A police constable was gunned down on Tuesday by unidentified men as he was escorting a polio vaccination team on the outskirts of Mardan.

The incident has consequently brought the polio campaign in the district to a halt.

According to District Police Officer Danishwar Khan, two men approached a constable on duty with polio immunisation workers in the Khawo Kallay Ghala Dher area at around 1:00 pm. They opened fire, killed the police officer, and managed to escape. The polio workers emerged unscathed.

Iman Jan, an official of the Sheikh Maltoon police, told The Express Tribune the constable – later identified as Said Muhammad – was guarding a female and a male polio worker. Apparently, the armed men approached the constable from a nearby sugarcane field just as the female worker went into a house and the male worker also stepped away to administer a vaccine. Constable Muhammad was drinking water when the assailants opened fire. They killed him and took his gun before fleeing.

“The police rushed to the spot, blocked off all three major exits, and launched a search operation immediately,” said Jan.

The body was taken to the Mardan Medical Complex for an autopsy and then shifted to Police Lines. Senior police officers participated in the funeral and took the body to the constable’s hometown in Mayar Kallay.

During his lifetime, Muhammad served at various police stations, including Par Hoti. He had been at Sheikh Maltoon for the last six months.

Initial investigations revealed the constable was shot six times, point blank.

After the incident, the district administration stopped the polio campaign in Mardan. So far, there is no information on when it will be resumed.

On January 29, a man was attacked by a local villager in the Rustam area as he tried to protect his sister during the polio campaign. The same day, a policeman was killed in the Gullo Dheri area of Swabi, fuelling the recent spate of targeted killings of polio teams across Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

Vaccination drives have commenced multiple times in Buner, Swabi, DI Khan, Tank, Charsadda and Mardan. Furthermore, some district governments imposed bans on pillion riding on motorcycles, as most of the assailants that single out polio workers use this mode of transport.

Additional reporting by Muhammad Irfan

Published in The Express Tribune, February 27^th, 2013.